All posts tagged ‘future’

Will we be able to transport to work in the future? (image: CBS Studios Inc)

“I remember when I used to think the year 2000 was the future. What an IDIOT I was.” – Jonathan Coulton (Jan 4, 2010 via Twitter)

As a free society we’ve always had a Utopian view of the future. This view has been reflected in movies, in literature and with cutting edge technology. From the realization of an actual hand held tablet similar to the one Picard held as he strolled around the Enterprise, to the imagined designs of futuristic electric cars – the future has always been one step ahead of the present. I guess that’s why it’s called the future. Growing up in the 1980′s and 1990′s, the 2000′s were always “the future.” Well, now the 2000′s are gone. So where are my flying cars? Where is my floating skateboard?

These ideals and visions of the future were ingrained into our brains as children, little did we realize that it was strictly fiction. However, the bright point is that all “future” technologies are based on a vision, in effect – fiction. The Dick Tracy comic strip envisioned video phone watches in the 1930′s. Electric cars have always been a stable of science fiction novels. Even the movie “Demolition Man” wasn’t far off in it’s envisioning of future mergers of companies and PC behavior. So in another way of looking at it, the future is here. We’re living in it. Sure it’s not exactly as we imagined it to be, but it’s getting there. I always warn though, if we’re not careful we’ll all be wandering around a complex in jumpsuits, cautiously checking the crystal in our palm as we wait for Carousel.Continue Reading Is The Future Here Yet

As 2009 winds down to its conclusion, much is being made of the decade drawing to a close, inspiring “best of” and “worst of” lists galore. But what about the decade that’s about to begin? Follow us as we use our Jedi powers to see the future and divulge to you the ten most significant geeky news stories of the 20-teens.

March 6, 2012 – Not content with trying to convince parents that vaccines are evil, Dr. Andrew Wakefield and Jenny McCarthy give impassioned speeches pointing out that a statistically very high percentage of the people diagnosed with autism were, at some point in the past, born. Unfortunately for them, the popularity of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader enlightens the general public to what the Scientific Method really means in a coherent manner. Torches and pitchforks ensue.

December 3, 2013 - FOX cancels Joss Whedon’s fourth installment of Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog on general principle, despite having nothing whatever to do with it.

July 19, 2014 – At Comic-Con, a geek celebrity harmonic convergence occurs when, from 1:03pm to 1:14pm Pacific Time, Wil Wheaton, Jonathan Coulton, Neil Gaiman, Joss Whedon, Adam Savage, Felicia Day, Nathan Fillion and J.J. Abrams are all in the same room at the same time. Geeks the world over, without knowing the reason why, look up from their laptops and smart phones and turn to face towards San Diego.

April 1, 2015 – The Wall Street Journal, the last major U.S. newspaper still being printed, ceases publication. When the news appears on WSJ.com, readers at first take it for an April Fools’ Day joke, until all seven remaining subscribers confirm that their copies failed to arrive. The story of the newspaper’s demise quickly falls off news websites’ front pages a few hours after appearing, due to the emergence of the 508th alleged mistress of Tiger Woods.

March 28, 2016 – The day after Easter, stores begin displaying Christmas items in preparation for the holiday season. Signs warning consumers that they have “Less than nine shopping months left!” appear on websites and public transit vehicles.

May 24, 2017 – To celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the premiere of Star Wars, George Lucas releases a new Special Edition of the original trilogy using technology stemming from James Cameron’s Avatar. In the new version, Han runs away from Greedo without shooting him, and the forest moon of Endor is replaced by Naboo. The consequent digital transformation of Ewoks into Gungans provides evidence to generations of fans that the Ewoks really weren’t so bad after all.

June 5, 2017 – For the first time ever, monthly U.S. sales (for May, that is) of fuel-cell automobiles surpass those of gas-electric hybrids (sale of pure internal-combustion vehicles having been banned as of January 1, 2016). Peak Oil experts, having lost a chief target for their cause, switch topics as a group to become Peak Hydrogen experts, starting the whole cycle all over again.

Colonel Savage

January 23, 2018 – U.S. President Tiffany Franklin opts to deliver her first State of the Union address via text message. The address reads, in its entirety, “d USA S doiN gr8! GBY n God bl$ d USA!”

February 11, 2018 – Adam Savage, now age 50, disappears from existence during a MythBusters shoot attempting to recreate Doc Brown’s time-traveling DeLorean from the Back to the Future movies. Shortly thereafter, a Western Union courier arrives to deliver a letter to Jamie Hyneman, explaining that Adam went back in time to late-1920s Kentucky and lived the remainder of his life as Colonel Harland Sanders. In hindsight, MythBusters fans everywhere wonder how they could have failed to notice this earlier.

When Star Wars was released in 1977 it went on to serve as the highest grossing film of all time (until ET knocked it out in ’82). Meaning, a ton of people went to see it.

Now, fast forward 30+ years and if you attend a Star Wars convention you are very much considered a geek. So, what will be the new “geek” in the year 2025? What popular movie, game, or activity that is around today will people be having mega-conventions for? What will geeks of the future obsess over? What will our kids be writing about in GeekDad then?

Well let’s take a peek into the time machine!

Swishing & Flicking @ Potter Celebration IV, London

Magic The Gathering Going Still Strong In College Dorms At The Age of 32

Celebrating Dr. Who’s Diamond Anniversary: Which Doctor was the best?

100 Things Our Kids Won’t Know About: Featuring “When Social networking could only be done through websites”, “When portable computing consisted of carrying around a 4lb slab of aluminum, glass, and a chemical battery”, and “Paper money”

Over at WebUrbanist there is a great post that looks at how advertisers, designers and marketers saw the future through what the site labels "retrofuturistic ads".

The ads are great – clearly selling the future as clean, bright and sleek. No steampunk or cyberpunk here folks. These ads are all about a Jetson’s type future: smooth lines, spaceships and clean air.

Check out the quote from the parody ad on the right: "Building a Fake Future: In hoping the real future will show up to mate with it". There are plenty of authentic ads over there though.

It is worth going over and having a look at this great collection. And, if there are any designers out there who want to do some desktop themes or iPhone skins using that type of the "retrofuturistic" aesthetic, let me know. I’d love to have my icons all retro-future.